After the show, makeup barely wiped off and hair still full of glitter, the girls log into FFXIV like it's a sacred ritual. Minnie lights a candle. (For luck. Obviously.)
Tonight? Treasure map night. Six players. One plan. Many regrets to come.
The lineup:
Kayla: back on Gunbreaker, and loudly announcing it.
Robin: Bard, because she insists on multitasking glamour and damage, but mostly glamour.
Minnie: ever-loyal Dancer, twirling into battle and probably still recording half of it.
Mona: Astrologian, ready to babysit everyone's HP bars and moral compass.
Jasmine: sleek new Reaper glamour, looking way too cool for 2 a.m.
Luna: quiet but deadly Monk, barely speaks in party chat but lets her crits do the talking.
Before they even leave town, Robin slaps down a rule:
"As party leader, only I can Need roll on loot. It's the law of the map."
Minnie: "Okay but counteroffer—everyone except the leader gets to roll."
Kayla: "Counter-counteroffer: we riot."
Robin ignores them and hops into her Regalia mount (courtesy of the collab event she refuses to explain), honking twice like she owns the game.
"Driver!" she calls.
Luna sighs, accepts her fate, and the car peels through Elpis. Kayla rides shotgun.Jasmine and Luna climb into the back seats without a word.
"VIPs only," Robin says sweetly.
Mona doesn't protest. She silently summons her Megalotragus mount and sips tea atop the giant goat like the royal priestess she is. Minnie scowls before spawning her Fat Cat, who sparkles with pink stars as it waddles proudly behind the convoy.
Their first stop: Jasmine's map. And immediately, chaos.
Robin spun in place, then suddenly her character struck a dramatic pose and began strumming an immaculate bard melody.
"Robin," Mona deadpanned, "are you… performing?"
"Auto-performing," Robin corrected proudly, hands nowhere near her keyboard. "I set up the software this morning. My bard now serenades the mobs while I eat cake."
Minnie nearly dropped her controller. "You're not even buffing us?!"
"Emotional support is a buff," Robin replied, sipping her drink.
The map party began as all map parties do — with chaotic optimism.
Kayla was already charging headfirst into the zone, aggroing half the wildlife population of Elpis before Robin had even finished setting her glam.
"Kayla, those aren't even treasure mobs!" Minnie squeaked as a wandering owlbear roared to life behind them.
"It's called efficient clearing," Kayla declared, already tanking over twenty mobs like her Gunbreaker license depended on it.
Meanwhile, Luna — silent as always — blinked across the screen, fists glowing. With Minnie's Dancer buff on her, she shredded through mobs like a wood chipper set to turbo mode.
"Luna's topping the charts again," Mona observed dryly, sipping tea between heals.
Robin clapped — literally, her Bard emote performed a soft applause as she sat atop a rock playing a perfectly looped melody, thanks to her auto-performance macro.
"Stellar effort, Luna!" she said, contributing absolutely nothing.
"Your damage contribution is five percent," Minnie muttered.
"Five percent more than zero is still five percent," Robin replied smugly. "Besides, I'm the party taxi."
And that much was true. Robin's Regalia car had brought the gang here — Jasmine and Luna crammed in the back seat, Kayla smug in shotgun next to Robin, who drove with one hand and serenaded with the other.
Jasmine tried to keep pace with Luna, her scythe slicing as she muttered combo pieces under her breath. "I swear I had that one... wait, no, it's Plentiful Harvest next, or was it—?" Her Reaper rotation was still a work in progress.
"Jasmine, you're doing great!" Mona encouraged. "You'll get a hang of it eventually."
A second later, Minnie's voice piped up on Discord:"Hey Robin? Wanna try moving out of that AoE?"
Silence.
"Cool, guess not," Minnie said. Then she grinned. "Mona, will you?"
"...Fine," Mona sighed. "I'll pull her."
Moments later, Robin's character was dragged — quite literally — into the center of a massive AoE via the healer "pull" trait.
Robin's Bard flopped to the ground like a dead fish, her melody ending in a flat twang.
"Oh no," she said in monotone. "I am deceased."
"You can stay that way," Mona snapped. "You don't get a raise until you participate."
Robin paused. "...Even if I say I'll give Kayla my rare loot drop?"
"What drop?" Kayla asked.
"The one from Jasmine's map. The Calfskin Rider's Cap mat."
Kayla gasped. "Okay no, she lives. She lives right now."
Mona grumbled, but raised her anyway.
Robin stood, stretched, and immediately resumed playing a smug victory fanfare. Auto-performed, of course.
"Glad to be back," she said sweetly. "Now. Who's ready for my map?"
Minnie blinked. "You didn't share your location yet."
"I will," Robin promised. "Right after we dig up yours."
She never did.
The chest drops mediocre loot. Robin Needs it anyway.Everyone boos. Robin bows.
Then comes Luna's map. A miracle run. One portal after another opens, tension rising each time.
"Is this... the last room?" Minnie whispers.
It is. And the final drop? A Ruinous Plume feather — one of the ultra-rare materials needed for the new Alkonost mount.
Kayla freezes.
"I need two more. Two! This is fate."
Robin, grinning: "Too bad. I rolled Need. Party leader law."
But miraculously... she gives it to Kayla anyway.
"You'd just whine about it for the rest of the night," she says. "I'm saving my ears."
Then, with a smirk:
"Besides, we're gonna grind this all week. Welcome to the loop, pals."
As the night winds down, everyone shares their map locations...Except Robin.
Minnie: "You said you'd post it after we did ours."
Robin: "I said a lot of things."
(Spoiler: her map was a dud anyway.)
End scene:Kayla starts drafting a "Feather Tracker Spreadsheet."Mona logs off quietly, whispering, "I'm too old for this."Jasmine practices on a training dummy by herself.Minnie's recording the whole thing for a "Treasure Map Fails" reel.
Luna goes off to do some dailies.
Robin? She's sitting on the car roof, loot bag full, typing one last line into party chat:
"GG, nerds."
Log out.